Friday, March 07, 2008

Environmentalists

[This discussion took place at UFOB in September 2006.]Crackpot Realists and Conservation

Environmentalists love to hate big oil companies. "I told you so," we say to ourselves, as we learn about BP’s leaky oil pipes in Alaska. The fiasco in Alaskacould spell serious trouble for BP, as the US Congress begins hearings. It is easy tocheer them on and urge them to take drastic actions against this corporate wrong doer. We should move beyond this knee-jerk reaction.

-- Sybil Ackerman, legislative affairs director for the Oregon League of ConservationVoters, writing in the Financial Times.

She may be unaware that BP's malfeasance, in spite of numerous warnings to get its act together, outpaces the rest of the industry in rate of deaths at refineries. Her admonition to lesser eviling is therefore worse than the usual fatuous score card-based squawking.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

I don't really have a problem with Gaia followers and assorted animal psychics and people with all kinds of beliefs about bonding with nature. My own experiences and beliefs, in fact, tend to make me quite sympathetic to them; getting back to wild places is like going to church for me, especially in the spiritual sustenance it gives. And I share their perspective that the natural world is the real world.

But I don't think these beliefs have any ground for being taken seriously in public-policy discussions, largely because I think spirituality at its core isprofoundly personal. For credibility, I think, we have to turn to science and the "common sense" approach of the conservationists.

--David Neiwert in response to a comment by Spartacus, in which he was urged to show some respect for people whose religious beliefs really do include regard for preserving the environment.

I think Neiwert would be harshly critical of Ackerman's idiotic op ed, but hew views are unfortunately representative of a good number of self-styled environmentalists. They're impossible to avoid in serious conservation work. It should go without saying, but there's more to conservation than NIMBYism, aromatherapy sessions after a Sierra Club brunch and nice jobs as lobbyists. A realist might wish to at least spendsome time with people whose practice of their religion has kept their immediateenvironment wholesome. Even if you don't share the beliefs, there is much to learn. Moreover, regard for the environment is a growing part of the US version ofChristianity. See Creation Care for details. There are also the Wendell Berry conservatives, and the angling enthusiasists, secular and otherwise. Realism in politics often extends to strange bedfellows. This Democratic haste to position oneself as reasonable is ill-thought out. Almost everyone, with the exception of crackpot realists and ignorant lobbyists, is reasonable compared to television pet psychics and cranky gurus. There's nothing reasonable about seeing a "realistic" approach to public policy in support for BP.

posted by J Alva Scruggs

As I've written about elsewhere, fascist totalitarianism requires the assent of the populace and the collaboration of ostensible opponents. But perhaps more importantly it requires time for its perverted ideas to develop in the minds of the populace, time to follow a progression of ideas that begins with the marginilization of other ideas and the people who believe them.

Once marginilization has succeeded in establishing that these other people's ideas are less valued, even dangerous, the ostracizing can proceed to step two--demonization. Through the process of demonizing, the views and ways of life of the already marginalized become a perceived threat to those of the dominant culture. Thisfear, real or unfounded, then becomes the basis for step three, or, the final solution.

The final solution, of course, is extermination. It doesn't have to be carried out enmasse, or by government officials; it can be just as well accomplished by vigilantes. In fact, a few seemingly random assaults, arsons, malicious harassments, and murders can go a long way in silencing dissent and stemming public participation in public affairs--perhaps more so than systematic purges by the state.

The important thing to remember, though, is that the progression from marginalize to demonize to exterminate is begun by acceptance of the opinion of someone you trust, someone like you, someone who expresses beliefs you share in common. Neoliberals start unsuspecting consumers down this relay, hand them off to neoconservatives, who in turn leave them at the doorstep of fascists.

The only way to stop this process of social disintegration is to nip it in the liberal bud.

Hippies

[This discussion took place at UFOB in September 2006.]

The Weeping Hippy Narrative

I'm thinking specifically of Sybil Ackerman, Patrick Moore and David Horowitz with this, though there's certainly no end of people who engaged in a bit of activism and then saw the light. et alia and I jokingly call the wingnut marketing of their conversion stories "weeping hippy narratives". They have a target audience. They appeal to wingnuts who need to feel that actions against the vengeful god, whose son is ass whuppin' Jesus, causes terrible grief, followed by partial redemption. The hippy is still contemptible and feckless, but at least he's made some concessions to reality. For a special bonus, pundits should write nasty things about the hippiesusing software fostered by this fellow.

The ideal weeping hippy narrative should be maudlin, disturbingly freudian and vastlyhypocritical. David Horowitz has set the bar very high, but there are other avenues and all of them are fecund. Moore has parlayed his time with Greenpeace into advocacyfor nuclear power which, if he reads the financial papers, he must know can't be built without massive subsidies and state curtailment of liability. The problems withdecommissioning and waste disposal remain unsolved. But neoliberal versions of the free market never required anything remotely like a free market. Ackerman warns her fellow hippies about the error of pursuing a "vendetta" against BP, which has ignoredall the warnings it was given about safety and leads the industry in refinery worker deaths. In a few years, she'll be ready to quit her work with the League of Conservation voters and write an op ed detailing her disillusionment with the environmental movement.

T.V. nailed the production number in this comment, emphasis mine:

I used to think that liberalism was essentially contractual and therefore adult, a system in which one made rational alliances with people for rational ends, despite feelings about their hair or lifestyle or vibration. The last few years have revealedit to be an infantilized, Oedipal dreamstate in which the goal is to reconcile with Mummy and Daddy and brother and sister, who are fascist wingers but who always have aheart of gold. It's like that with the nation, too: we're a national family, and everybody has a role. No matter how ugly they talk, Mummy and Daddy will always melt if we are firm and loving with them. And we know how to handle the punked-out "radical" brother or sister, whose moral rigidity is always just an irritating adolescent phase of preening "purity" that should met with cold, disapproving shunning; after being ostracized for a decade, they'll grow up, or they'll be the black sheep. These are simple, timeless roles, as in vaudeville, and we always comfortably know just where we are.

The fact that this discourse flows so thickly and irremediably at the site of a guy who looked into the abyss a few years ago and didn't hesitate to call what he saw 'fascism' pretty much underscores just how culturally fucked we really are.

There it is. Some of those who don't "grow up" eventually go mad from the ostracism and more than few face a cat food dinner retirement. The forward thinking have a valuable lesson to teach: when you reach a position of prominence, be ready for an abrupt volte face. Lay the groundwork early on, if at all possible. It will help get you plenty of career.

posted by J Alva Scruggs

It's all very obvious if you grew up in a fundamentalist (I refuse to use their new cuddly phrasing of 'evangelical') church.

No preacher is more popular with the hoi polloi than the one who used to do the drinkin' and fightin' and other things with dropped 'g's.

Why we are ruled by people who sincerely believe things* that should have them strapped to a bed on heavy doses of Thorazine in a civilized world is beyond me.

*most of the people reading those godawful Last Times books really believe that they're true. At least the ones I know. Demons and angels and antichrists oh my!

Posted by winnaAs you observe, marginilization is an essential aspect of the ongoing psychological warfare between destroyers and creators.

Posted by Spartacus

Winn, the belief appears to diminish the higher up the food chain you go. I know the bedrock angry people, who live on vengeance fantasies and dream of a day when they'llbe an elite. I also know the cynical manipulators, who turn the belief on and off asneeded. I joke about it sometimes, but a society that felt treating tooth decay was worthwhile would have a lot fewer vengeful fantasists.

Spartacus, I hope some day to find a way to convince the nice liberals to stop rescuing vicious, cynical pundits.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

A disturbing incident I recall from the 1980s was listening to an otherwise kind neighbor deriding hippie culture, peace and love, before his young children.

Posted by Spartacus

Disappointment in promise unfulfilled, the influx of cynical opportunists seeking to monetize the culture and no small amount of propaganda went into the mood of anger inthe eighties. I fell for it myself, even though there were grounds for me to know better.

What I didn't understand well at the time was that authoritarians teach a lesson of self-loathing, in every way they can. They isolate people and uproot them. They belittle them through the media and recruit shills, who will affect the "look and feel" of a culture.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggsauthoritarians teach a lesson of self-loathing, in every way they can

It's the application of THE principal tenet of marketing - tell them and show them how they should be dissatisfied with their lives - to every aspect of life and living. Then, the authoritarians say "look at us, we are in control of our lives", so therefore you should let us help you manage yours.

Which is why I return always to Fromm's "Escape from Freedom", from the mid-60's wherein he nailed, early, the rise and now almost complete doiminance in the USA (and/or Western societies) of what he called "the marketing personality". Somewhat prophetic, I think.

OTHER: Our neighbors don't trust us. I guess we're kind of like hippies to them. Theythink we do drugs.

HE: But we do do drugs.

OTHER: And we're pathetic hippies to boot. We like our comfort too much.

Posted by Phil Anthropoid

Most of the hippies I've known have been fairly abstemious, but if you're already doing drugs we'll be chasing the dragon behind the Dumpster as soon as the Tutor has passed out. Drop on by. The more the merrier, I always say.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

I hate to see old wipping heepies die, so I will throw this in. Some Cognressman on cnn says yesterday, from the floor of Cognress, "You cannot deal with terrorists in Bergenstocks." I think he meant Birkenstocks, and I don't think he meant that terrorists carry their sandy footprints on their soles, but there he was, saying it, on the floor of Cognress. It's enough to make a heepie wip. Idn't it?

Posted by ahfukitThe first hippy I knew had the scars of taking a machine gun burst across his chest and abdomen, from his service in the Korean War. The honorable dildo from whatever state needs to scrape the dogshit out of his ears and quit thinking of hippies as his partyfriends from the days he was wasting his parents' money at college.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

The hippies I hung with started housing trusts, consumer cooperatives, and community gardens so poor people--no matter what creed--could pay rent and still eat. Is that grounds for bringing them up before HUAC?

Posted by SpartacusIt's still part of the narrative to hold hippies responsible for losing the Vietnam war. That sits in uneasy juxtaposition with the claims that we actually won.

I seriously consider the wailing of the wingnuts over hippy this and hippy that to bea species of self-loathing guilt.

Killing Culture

[The following discussion took place at UFOB in June 2006.]

The economics of graduate education are messy. Education is paid for by thegovernment, the parents, various foundations and endowments, by the studentsthemselves (in part by their low-paid labor), and by the undergraduate students andtheir funders. The beneficiaries are the faculty, the researchers, and the studentsthemselves. One of the peculiarities of humanities graduate schools is that theirmain products are of interest only to themselves: new humanities research and newPhD's.

But the new PhD's, while potential beneficiaries of the PhD monopoly of collegeteaching jobs, are also effectively competing with their teachers for whatever jobsthere are. This leads to tension when grad students and adjunct PhD's notice thatsome tenured faculty are either over the hill, or else are using their jobs mostly tofinance a nice lifestyle while doing only the minimal research required to keep theirjobs. (For some, scholarship is the reason they went into the profession; for others,it is just the price you have to pay for a cushy job).

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs 06/25/2006I've written previously about my difficulties with the gatekeepers of academia in mypursuit of doctoral work and faculty positions. In these earlier posts, I mostlyfocused on the apparent non-compliance factor in my rejections: having considerableexperience, recognition, and acclaimed publications to my credit actually workedagainst me.

What I overlooked, though, was the age barrier. I'm only 53.

But in a recent conversation with another highly creative intellectual--who justhappens to have been rejected at the same institution where I did my graduate studies--I discovered that over 50 is indeed considered a liability there, not because ofdiminished energy or brilliance, but because it conflicts with the college'smarketing brand of being young and hip.

Posted by Spartacus

I can't count anymore the number of people I know who should be and could be teaching, who are hanging in there under pressure, and who were driven out or pushed aside.Back when getting a formal education was an option for me, I had a friend who washired at a great place to work, a sweet architectural design firm, with a degree inphilosophy. His employer, he said, wanted someone with an education, who could alsostill think. I was young enough to be blown away by that.

It's not just academia, either.

Several years ago, a wealthy Bostonian became interested in the problem of drugaddiction. A foundation colleague helped introduce him to a well respected drugcounseling and treatment center. The wealthy gentleman was impressed with its work,so he decided to make a large donation to the organization. My colleague was takenaback when the donor stipulated that his gift not be used for salaries and other“overhead” expenses. Not knowing how else to respond, she told the donor that drugcounseling and treatment are salaries and overhead expenses.

Compare this process to the way the wingnut borg is handling the building of itsculture. Phil at the Gift Hub has mentioned many times the process of funding andhiring that makes an intellectual/propaganda network possible. It is taking over thephilosophically liberal structures where an education is increasingly difficult, butstill possible. The obsessive monetization turns learning into a race to the bottomfor acquiring qualifications and place, with a harshly limited outlook for being ableto pursue it full time. Able people start to look elsewhere, and acquire skills,which is not necessarily a bad thing, but they are not going to be replaced by peoplewho have decades of experience and the teaching they can still manage is impromptu. Iread a lot of blogs that are a close equivalent to hedge schools, published by peoplewho have everything it takes to teach, except for a marketable quality.

posted by J Alva Scruggs

For those who might ask what's the big deal?, I refer you to the right-wing coup ofthe Southern Baptist Convention and its extensive assets. University and governmenttreasuries are no less formidable when deployed in the cause of fundamentalism nowmerged with organized crime.

Posted by Spartacus

In talks with right wing religious people, I've found that they're often quite upbeat, even happy, and that being part of something with some very clear precepts has madethem enthusiastic about sharing the good news. They have apocalyptic ups and downs,but those are generally fairly shallow. Only the deeply damaged are obsessive, andthey come to dominate because they have what it takes to wage attrition throughunreasonableness. Eventually, it's easier to let them have their way. They're notespecially grand manipulators. Just persistent.

Quite a few of the religious righties I've spoken to are not suffering from a falseconsciousness in any way. Things I consider terrible sacrifices are worthwhiletrade-offs for them. They were very, very unhappy. Now they're not. The bullyingwingnut cretins are a minority, who drag them into rotten activities through peerpressure, relentless unpleasantness and the cheap thrill of getting away with being ajerk.

Kurt Vonnegut wrote about psychopathic personalities whose decisiveness is unhamperedby empathy or considerations of decency. That state of mind is very attractive topeople who are unhappy. I've felt that way myself: if only I were free of thinkingI'm a jerk for doing X, Y or Z. Then I could be effective. I can say I would pass onthe promise of that, and support in my efforts to achieve it, because I tried it onceand couldn't hack it. A little voice in me cried, "bullshit", and I couldn't drown itwith drugs, liquor or anything else. The pitch I got was: come, let us be uncertainand struggle together. It appealed to me because I had all these nagging doubts andwanted company. The certainties of it were veiled. They were, as I alluded in theprevious post, a test of my willingness to go along. That's the big step.

I find my community now among the rejectionists, the pariahs, the endlessly fuckedover and the people who are scared of being fucked over again. Membership in that isnot a lot to offer people.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

I don't know. I had a neighbor whose exuberant dogs I walked in junior high who wouldhave probably qualified as one of those upbeat Christian types. Once I was presentfor a theological conversation between her and her husband. I think it had to do witha local church whose minister was letting the parishioners perform baptisms onthemselves rather than presiding Dadlike over the ritual himself. Neighbor lady wastaken aback by this anarchy. Husband, marginally more sympathetic, said it could beseen as "the priesthood of all believers," solid Protestant-citizen material, youknow. In the end the neighbor lady expressed her skepticism about such interpretativelicense by shrugging that she supposed it was an instance of "the fires burninghotter."

What she meant by this--I know because I'd heard her say it before--was that theambiguity of the doctrine was a deliberate test set out by God, a kind of bait orentrapment, and if the mark interpreted incorrectly, he would suffer all the morehowlingly in hell to have been so close, as it were, to have been so lucky to havehad the correct answer there in his vicinity but to have missed it nonetheless.

The whole of my objection to the desert religions rests in that anecdote. I think thewoman who said it would have counted as one of the "moderates," one of the upbeat andnot obviously sociopathic exemplars of the faith. But the violent, infantilizedauthoritarianism and cruelty is so deeply inbred in Christianity that I'm veryskeptical that even the "nice" ones escape being fundamentally shaped by it. Here's awoman who looks at the people sitting next to her at the PTA, or selling hergroceries, and she can serenely contemplate them screaming in torture forever over atrivial point of doctrine--not just that, but triumph that they got tricked.Pwned by God! And it's active torture we're talking about, forever. I heard a lot ofstuff like that growing up--it was so normalized that even long after I was anatheist it didn't dawn on me for years just how morally abject, how grotesque andinhuman that vision really is. Yet if you subtract from Christianity all the peoplewho would reject the doctrine of hell, I'm not sure who that leaves you with besidesa few freethinking Episcopalians and Unitarians and a gaggle of assorted New Agers.

Upbeat good cheer and intratribal hugginess is compatible with unspeakable crueltyand casual, utterly inhuman retractions of fellow feeling--not just for strangers andothers but for the people one sees or works with every day. For that reason theanecdote also expresses the whole of my objection to the authentic happiness crowd,who are a secularized version of the same anti-ethical form of life.

Posted by T.V.

T.V., the satisfaction the doctrinally correct get from the thought of otherssuffering seems less religiously based to me than it does class based. Secularwingnuts of that class like torture too, and in this world. I do think the desertreligions lend themselves very well to infantilized authoritarianism, but I've seenthe same gloating in people of other faiths. What they had in common was frustrated,and sometimes insatiable, managerial ambitions. I think a good bit of religion isginned up to meet that desire, in much the same way as crank philosophy. It providesa respectable cover. It's something that can get space on the NY Times op ed page.

I went a little batshit after the Abu Ghraib story broke and I found secular liberalssolemnly discussing the morality of torture. Perhaps they've never hurt anyone orbeen hurt, but the ghoulishness of deciding how much and what kinds of torture areacceptable, from the lofty absraction of blogs and published journals, seems an awfullot like the satisfaction of the fires burning hotter woman. I had expected more thanrevulsion followed by, "yes. . . but. . ." So not quite as overt and not quite filledwith false piety, but the abdication to a remote force that would handle it withoutmaking their nice houses messy was still there.

There's a different quality to the sadism of the doctrinally correct than theincoherent hatred of the less well-schooled. It takes a college experience -- Ihesitate to say education -- to give someone the ammo to be an adept cretin. Some ofthis is class based.

The upbeat people among my formerly completely broken religious righties refuse tothink about ugly or cruel consequences. They do a weird shift if they absolutely haveno choice but to see it. They cope with screaming fits, breaking things, looks ofprofound shock and tears, followed by accusations of being hated by the people whohave forced them to look. Dobson and his fellow travelers make a pretty pennyconditioning them into being able to do it themselves.

In the absence of religion, wingnuts and managerial ghouls, nominally liberal orpseudocon, still look for that element of personal sanctity that makes hurting othersacceptable and even a pleasurable duty, provided they don't have to get too dirtythemselves. Social Darwinism works for the secular.

Religion looks more like a tool for something to me than a cause. The culture oflimitless control is my culprit.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

T.V., that's why I find the image of Jehovah as a thoroughly damaged, warped, evenevil fragment of the true godhead so...appealing. The apologists have neversuccessfully answered the Question of Evil if they assume that Jehovah is somehowpure and good. So...what if he is not, what if he is a mad, gibbering, flawed pieceof a greater deity?

Gnosticism does have a lot of craziness associated with it, but not as much asorthodoxy, imo.

Posted by Brian Miller

Mr. Scruggs, a worthy essay, One of my favorite "other" blogs is the relentlesslysecular Butterflies and Wheels. I think, frankly, they lose site of the very realityyou summarize so well. A link to your post will be worthwhile, tomorrow, methinks.

Posted by Brian Miller

Hi there Mr. Miller. I'm not completely convinced that my cultural culprit is not aproduct of the Christian culture. It's hard to disentangle, as religion is also verymuch a means of governance and a philosophy of goverance. It's incredibly useful tobe able to say He said.

Hmmm. What I'm groping towards is saying I still have a chicken and egg problem.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

Further thoughts on this.

Younger people's intellects are easier to weaponize, both and students andinstructors. Militarization runs deep in our society. Hence the disdain for Spartacus,among others, who are too old, too individuated and too rounded to be comfortableturning out hyper-specialized students.

Desert religions evolved alongside a constant flux of uncertainty, famine, war andforced migrations. A lot of the efforts at ethical thinking in the literatureconcerns the proper use of violence, control hierarchies, duties and massive cruelty.

Religion gets adapted to meet people's needs at the time. Schisms are constants asare evolving intepretations within the orthodoxy. The happy camping religion ofbroken people is not the same as the punitive hellfire of the doctrinally correctmanagerial class, even though they're both called Christian. They're both differentfrom the free thinking Episcopalians, whose ways and thoughts are very much in linewith social democracy.

The psychopyrotechnical goo of the Zizek devotees provides a different kind of social function forcover. I've been invited to view it as a symptom, but it's really just amanifestation of a desire to be an asshole in a respectable way.

Assertive victimology and a right to provocation have no place in the freethinkingreligions.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

I don't think Jehovah is even a fragment of the true godhead, although there areregions in which whole groups of people have miniaturized things around such athought, which is not very bright because they also think it's a large andcomprehensive thing (even). The aim should be to get all the way away from 'truegodhead,'including forgetting about the 'true Christianity' or the 'true [any]religion, because those flute notes from Arjuna to Krishna were few in number--theywere probably just some nobleman playing the flute for somebody else, and a scribemade up the story--still sold in Hare Krishna stalls the world over! Then yourcultural culprits might have bolder outlines--like the closing of the Kilgoreclassical music station in favour of selling to shit Christian-pop bullshit asreported in NYTimes today.

That niceness of the moderate Christians who aren't full-time hateful is thetrickiest of all. Thanks for the warning, as I need to have this as a kind ofre-indoc thing at least weekly, because I have to deal with some of these and theyare sore afraid that they might not overturn me. It may also be important, if we talkabout sadists enjoying suffering, to be able to learn how to enjoy watching sadistssuffer. I really don't think there is any choice. This could be circular, but itcould also be a way of keeping the juices flowing--doesn't matter about the critiqueabout hypocrisy that will be inevitable from the put-upon now-powerless neocons, justso long as they're penned up.

Mr. NYP, the critique of the neocons I'm going with for now is that they hit thejackpot at a time when there was a need for their brand of snake oil aggression. Theneed looks likely to shift to the Kristof and Tom Friedman brand next. The desire foraggression hasn't gone away. It does need better branding. The genius, such as it is,of the DLC types lies in peddling a warmed over version of Papa Doc Bush's kinder,gentler aggression. I have no doubt it will eventually sell well.

What too many forget is the murders and genocides committed by our oh so kind andgentle Democratic Party. I'm sure the Serb villagers driven out of their ancestralhomes by KLA Criminal Syndicates are forgiving of the Great Empathicizer's littlebombing war of liberation in the Balkans. At least there was some competence, lessoutright looting, involved, no?

Posted by Brian Miller

I was merely alluding to the opportunistic nature of the merger between these twoinbred lineages of American conservatism. The all-out culture war that resulted fromthis arranged marriage has plenty of fuel, but needs to consolidate its shallowideological gains by ousting all opposition.

Theocracy cannot abide academic freedom, only the pretense of it.

Posted by Spartacus

'What too many forget is the murders and genocides committed by our oh so kind andgentle Democratic Party.'

Then they should shut up talking about how wonderful Bill Clinton was--even if he was. I don't think anybody thinks the Democratic Party is 'kind and gentle' and I don'tthink anybody is kind and gentle--just look at saints, they're all sadists too.Aggression is all right, one needs a subtler narrative to combat inertia, except wheninertia suffices (I like it for brief periods of each day.)

Or rather, I shouldn't say 'aggression is all right,' but it is not going to alwayssuffice as the 'first theme' of everything. People have tried it and it has neverworked, because everybody is aggressive.

Fair point, Mr. NYP. It seems like too much trouble to say "unprovoked aggression asconstant policy", but that's what it should have been.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

I missed your second comment until just now, Spartacus. I agree with the conclusions.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

J:

I think your class-first argument is mostly compelling. Religion at its worst doesseem to follow fractures of class or race that would have been played out evenwithout supernatural justifications. I think where I balk is at the stories for thechildren. If you imagine a safe and settled culture, free of the sedimented strifethat would train up kids in obviously grotesque hatreds, and imagine the kidsimbibing the usual Sunday school tales...well, I think the themes of raw, grovellingauthoritarian submission & grandiose S&M power relations are far worse than themilitarized kid's-channel TV stuff I try unsuccessfully to keep my son from beingimmersed in, and I think they could twist people who would otherwise be untrained insocial cruelties into accepting them as justified. They're not like reading HarryPotter, or the original rather nasty Grimm's tales, either, because kids who imbibethose tales are told that they're real. That's a crucial categorical distinction forkids. Nathan asks that all the time. Is magic real? Are dinosaurs real? Is a laserreal? Is heaven real? As Brian says, Jehovah deserves to be treated precisely as theGnostics treated him, as a crazed megalomaniac villain on Power Rangers. Teachingkids to bow down before that is horrible, and I confess I think there's a connectionbetween such early training and something like Abu Ghraib even if I can't prove itsociologically. While one can make a very plausible case that cruelty would run ourmonkey world with or without religion, I think one can also make a case that religionis the originary source of the implant that makes it possible for gentle people whowould otherwise be appalled by torture to consider it thinkable, even acceptable, ifcarried out by the proper authorities.

If I had to choose between kid's books about suffocating giant mother squirrels andbooks in which the entire human race is drowned out of spite and prophets who calldown murderous bears on children for laughing at them, I'd choose the former whileholding out for something better than either of these Hobson's choices.

Posted by T.V.

TV: I just want to say "excellent." I think Arthur Silber has an excellent series ofarticles summarizing how our child-rearing practices, including "religion" lead tothe very cruelties and corruptions we see throughout history.(powerofnarrative.blogspot)

Posted by Brian Miller

Jesus, with the children at his knees, was not talking of hell burning hotter; he wastalking about humility, kindness, and mildness. The Gospels, I truly think, are thebest source for many of the anti-Pharissaical sentiments expressed on this blog.Being "anti-Christian" is not a great stance for winning hearts and minds in theheartland. But reading the Gospels might be.

Posted by Tutor

Read the passage in context, liberal. It was after the Pharisees were trying to tripup the Lord on matters of divorce and physical relations between a man and woman.It's clear as day the gospel is showing us that abortion is wrong. Anything else isfancy city talk.

Try that sort of thing in the church were I worship and we'll show you the chains,liberal. And then you'll weep—but I won't. I'm forgiven.

Liberalism

[The following is a discussion on liberalism that took place at UFOB in August 2006.]

The video I put up is the product of years of frustration over progressive claims tosupport a kind of liberalism that itself has been mythologized. There has never beena golden age. There have been sporadic successes of democratic social movements,which were all bitterly opposed until the party structure saw no alternative but tomake some concessions. The cries of "take back the party" or "take back the country"are the fatuous bleatings of angry consumers, who nevertheless show up at the "pointof sale" and hand over everything they've got without doing a thing to ensurereciprocity. Even the degenerate barter method of social contracts demands betterthan that.

The alpha consumers -- Daily Kos, Firedoglake, Stirling Newberry, Steve Gilliard. . inter alia -- buy into the trickle down theory of political power. They want toelect Democrats who will then supposedly enact the reforms they claim to support.This is the exact reverse of the way things work. The social movement comes first.The politician is granted a conditional opportunity to put things into law. Thetrickle down activism of alpha consumers ensures an endless parade of careeristtriangulators, whose accommodation to "reality" is to put the success of theircampaigns first, by any means that won't get them sent to prison.

I use the terminology of a cynical, rigged marketplace because that is the mostaccurate for what they have built. When the product they receive is a lemon, they getirate at the very people who yelled at them for walking into a shuck. I could benicer about my characterizations, and I have been. In response, I've gotten largedoses of condescending hogwash and the petulant trolling of people who handle buyer'sremorse with temper tantrums. Frustrated ridicule is all I have left! Whenprogressives are ready to get back to this little planet the rest of us call earth,and knock off the brand management triangulation, we might be able to have aconversation.

posted by J Alva Scruggs on 08/27/2006

You might be interested in the liberal apologist series written by Orcinus' guestblogger Sara Robinson--classic neo-liberal arguments for surrendering our republic tofascism. If you can stomach it, it's actually instructive to read the comments bythese delusional people to understand their fantasies about democracy.

Posted by Spartacus

I did get through two of them. I really couldn't bear it. It reminded me of talkswith a friend, very bright fellow, far more erudite than me, who had found peace ofmind through becoming a devotee of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh. The structure he built forlooking at the world was seamless and impenetrable. The neoliberals come very closeto that.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

So true. The regular crowd at Orcinus is almost like a cult. I wouldn't bother,except my colleague Dave Neiwert is a renowned blogger, and I suspect we might reachsome lurkers and thus inoculate them against these toxic ideas. I've also metpotential recruits there.

Posted by Spartacus

I neglected to mention that in her latest installment she marginalizes the Far Left(those who risked their lives in the Civil Rights Movement) and extolls those whoworship racist warmongerers like Richard Nixon, Billy Graham, and Teddy Roosevelt.Needless to say, I am not inclined toward mercy when she claims to be a scholar ofhumanities.

Posted by Spartacus

I read the comments on the last post over there. You attracted the attention of aneoliberal wingnut, who marginalized you without apparently reading more than a fewwords of what you wrote. He also seems to be under the impression that the liberalshe listed drive policy. The odds are high he voted for people who did their best toundermine and negate the influence of Conyers, Kucinich, Waters et al.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

I used to think that liberalism was essentially contractual and therefore adult, asystem in which one made rational alliances with people for ratiaonal ends, despitefeelings about their hair or lifestyle or vibration. The last few years have revealedit to be an infantilized, Oedipal dreamstate in which the goal is to reconcile withMummy and Daddy and brother and sister, who are fascist wingers but who always have aheart of gold. It's like that with the nation, too: we're a national family, andeverybody has a role. No matter how ugly they talk, Mummy and Daddy will always meltif we are firm and loving with them. And we know how to handle the punked-out"radical" brother or sister, whose moral rigidity is always just an irritatingadolescent phase of preening "purity" that should met with cold, disapprovingshunning; after being ostracized for a decade, they'll grow up, or they'll be theblack sheep. These are simple, timeless roles, as in vaudeville, and we alwayscomfortably know just where we are.

The fact that this discourse flows so thickly and irremediably at the site of a guywho looked into the abyss a few years ago and didn't hesitate to call what he saw'fascism' pretty much underscores just how culturally fucked we really are.

Posted by T. V.

I was going to make a post of this, but it serves better as a follow up to yourcomment.

A Brief Guide

Liberals think the state can and should have a positive role to play in the lives ofthe people who live in it. Dennis Kucinich is a liberal.

Corporate liberals think the state, and state supported private enterprise, can andshould have a positive role to play in the lives of the people who live in it. RussFeingold is a corporate liberal.

Neoliberals are corporate liberals who have come to believe that the state and statesupported private enterprise will somehow bring about a free market which will have apositive, governing role to play in people's lives, wherever they live. Some of thembelieve state supported religion should be included in governance too. It can all bewell managed, provided people are incentivized properly to cooperate. Hillary Clintonis a neoliberal.

Fascists believe people can and should have a positive role to play in the lives ofthe state, state supported private enterprise and state supported religion, whichthey will run. George Allen is a fascist.

Liberals and, to a lesser extent, corporate liberals think some strong checks arenecessary on any concentration of power, and that these checks can be made functionalwithin the state. Neoliberals believe the checks will come into being, through bettermanagement and passive coercion. Fascists believe the strongest possible checks areneeded on the people, to ensure they play positive roles in the state.

Liberals are a tiny, tiny minority of the population and some of them are Democrats.That doesn't make Democrats liberals. The majority of Democrats are neoliberals, witha few fossil corporate liberals trying to puzzle things out. That debased form ofliberalism is how they plan to govern. Democratic apologetics based on neoliberalismbeing "less evil" overlook something important. Fascism doesn't come into beingwithout active assistance.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

Appreciate your eloquent clarity on this J. Alva. In an earlier recommendation at thereferenced liberal weblog, I observed that bedrock indigenous nations and peopleshave a useful perspective that has been all but ignored, and even offered an audiointerview link to introduce this audience to a different point of view.

Sadly, they ignored my suggestion, and went on to belabor how ignorant everyone iscompared to themselves, noting that with greater focus on the use of deceptivedevices, we'll eventually all be fooled into supporting the neoliberal agenda.

Posted by Spartacus

Thanks, Spartacus.

It may sound cranky and conservative, but I think neoliberals have an aversion towork, with an affinity for busyness. I've been following the trade squabble news. Thenegotiators produced a great deal of bad faith posturing, especially those from thewealthier nations, and went to extreme lengths to ensure their proposals were whollyunacceptable, even to people anxious to sell out the people of their countries. Itbecame apparent to even the most gullible jouranlists that the US negotiator wanted afailure, to protect the staus quo. It reminded me a great deal of the way Democratstreat their constituents.

Squaring that abuse with a vision of managerial competence leaves no room forlearning about perspectives that have more relevance to their situation. They're allwrapped up in that inane, machiavel-lite branding effort.

Posted by J. Alva Scruggs

I suspect there is something about the faith in human progress through such humaninventions as science that allows people who call themselves progressives to actuallybelieve their understanding of reality is superior to that of intact indigenoussocieties.

How else could they make remarks like "there is no place in public policy for beliefsabout spiritual relationships between species."